


I Will Always Find You

by theWickedWitchofFeels



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: ANGST!!!, Enchanted Forest AU, F/F, Sadness, Swan Queen - Freeform, Swen - Freeform, Time Travel AU, swan queen week day 3: time traveling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-15
Updated: 2015-07-15
Packaged: 2018-04-09 10:44:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,212
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4345505
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theWickedWitchofFeels/pseuds/theWickedWitchofFeels
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Swan Queen Week: Day 3 - Time Travel</p><p>Warning: some feels.</p><p>lyrics are from the song "All I Want" by Kodaline</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Will Always Find You

**Author's Note:**

> "All I want is nothing more, than to hear you knocking on my door  
> Cause if I could see your face once more  
> I could die a happy man, I’m sure."

Emma let her scream die away, echoing hopelessly off of the stone walls of her prison. She closed her eyes, resting, trying to ignore the pain of the shackles digging in the soft skin of her wrists. Her throat burned from her constant cries for help, her body weak from months of imprisonment. 

Who am I kidding. No one’s coming. 

No...I can’t think like that! Henry will…

Her chest felt tight with pain as a thick cloud of despair settled over her. She slumped in her bonds, pressing her forehead low to the cold stone floor. She heard Lily - or, at least, the strange topsy-turvy Enchanted Forest version of Lily - slide a bowl of gruel under the bars within her reach, but she ignored it. 

She had lost track of time since the Author’s book had sucked her into this twisted version of the Enchanted forest, since her own mother, now the Evil Queen, had had her locked up here for trying to put things right. And even she, the Savior, was helpless here. Her only hope was rescue, but who would come for her? She had no way of knowing if Henry had even been sucked into the book with them, and everyone else was...different. Regina was the bandit Snow White had once been, Charming was...some sort of evil lackey of Snow White’s, she hadn’t seen Hook at all. 

Was this how she would live the rest of her days? Chained in this tower, alone, hated, until the Queen finally decided to do away with her, or she died of disease or starvation.

It was a fate worse than death.

She didn’t even move her head at the sound of approaching footsteps, though they were different than the guards’; a higher sound such as heels might make on stone. Maybe it was the Queen. Maybe she would finally be put out of her misery. The fact that she even thought this with little more than a feeling of numbness scared Emma more than anything else. 

“Emma!” 

Emma’s head flew up at the sound, dull green-gray eyes widening and sparking to life. It was Regina, but not the bandit she had seen briefly in the woods; this was her Regina, mother of their child and, she had come to know, the love of her life. 

“Regina?” Emma whispered hoarsely, barely able to believe what she saw. It had to be a hallucination, brought on by starvation, dehydration, maybe she really was going mad - 

“It’s me, shh!” Regina hushed her, her head swinging from side to side as she checked for guards. Her fingers fumbled noisily with the key, sending shudders of fear through Emma.

“Me shh? You shh!” Emma winced; the state of her throat made in excruciatingly painful to talk much above a whisper now. 

“Eloquently put, Miss Swan.”

Yep. It was Regina, all right. 

“How did you…?”

“I used a spell to come back here and turn back time,” Regina said. She got the door open and rushed to her; next moment Emma found herself being gently helped to her feet, Regina’s sweet apple cider-y scent enveloping her like a warm blanket on a winter’s day. Soft hands went to her shackles, freeing her hands; and she vaguely heard Regina draw in a sharp breath at the state of her wrists.

“Oh...Regina…” Emma panted, leaning on the brunette for support. 

“You’re okay, I got you. C’mon, we’re going home.” 

Emma didn’t have the strength nor the will to protest, though her heart clenched in fear. What if they were found?

“Regina, why - ?”

“Things went wrong in the other timeline,” Regina said quietly. “The Dark One broke free of Gold, and went after me - you sacrificed yourself to contain it, but it made you a -”

“A monster,” Emma finished.

“This was the only thing I could think of to set things right...to change the timeline so that that never happens.” 

“But...how did you find me?”

“I will always find you.” 

Regina started towards the door with Emma and made her way carefully down the stairs. Both of them stared into the darkness that surrounded them, their ears straining for any sign of the guards. 

“Emma, I - “ Regina began, but there was the sound of a sword being drawn and a sudden, terrible choked cry as a blade was rammed through her from behind. 

Suddenly, Emma found herself supporting Regina instead of the other way around. She whirled, sensing another presence, and saw Lily, her eyes glowing yellow in the darkness. She held up her bloodied sword, illuminated by the strange light, and grinned maliciously.

Then, she was gone. 

“Regina? Regina!” 

The former Queen was gasping desperately for breath, her hands soaked in blood where she was desperately trying to staunch the bleeding from where the sword had gone clean through her back and protruded from her chest. 

“No, no no - please god no -” Emma whispered like a prayer. She pressed her hands over Regina’s, but it was no use, there was too much blood, and Regina’s eyes were closing -

“No - PLEASE - NO!” 

She pressed her lips desperately to Regina’s, but there was no flash of warmth, only coldness. 

“Em - “

“Regina, I’m here...I love you...please don’t…” 

She heard the sound of a final, rattling breath; then, nothing.

“...go.” 

Emma was left alone, in the darkness, her eyes staring in horror. This couldn’t be real. This had to be some terrible nightmare - perhaps someone had slipped something into her gruel. Yes, that was it. 

But as the long minutes stretched by, it became more real. And when the guards came for her, carrying torches that threw Regina’s body into sharp relief, and she saw the wound, and the beautiful chocolate brown eyes staring into nothing -

Emma had been sure that was it, the escape attempt would be enough for the Queen to finally decide to do away with her, to do away with her agony. But she did not. Emma was forced to live on, even as she slumped sobbing in her cell listening to the guards burying Regina in a shallow grave outside her tower. 

She stopped eating, barely drinking. And when her son and (ex?) boyfriend burst into her cell one day, she was a shadow of her former self. She went with him, barely caring if she lived or died; but somehow she lived, escaping Lily and getting back to the mainland.

But this time, there was no bandit in the woods. She fought the “white knight” Rumplestiltskin by herself, and Henry found that he was the Author and wrote them all back to Storybrooke. 

But someone was missing. Henry looked around, bewildered; but Emma knew the truth. 

“Moms” became just “mom”. 

And when she stood in the town square, the darkness came right for her, the heart with the greatest potential for darkness. She fell to her knees, sobbing, agony covering her like a dark wave, and she thought she saw her; but she was gone. Regina Mills was gone, and her mission had failed. Emma was still to be the Dark One, the monster.

With her last thought, Emma cried out to her, hoping against hope that wherever she was, somehow she would hear her.

“I will always find you!”

**Author's Note:**

> "But if you loved me…why’d you leave me?  
> Take my body  
> Take my body..."


End file.
